Mumbai: A coaching class owner, who appeared for the clerical post competitive exam for Palghar district last month and circulated the answers via text messages, has been arrested.

The Palghar crime branch nabbed Amar Khandalkar (36) from Nagpur where he was hiding. The exam for 134 clerical posts held on October 4, was declared null and void after the answers were leaked. The re-exam was held on October 18, when answers were allegedly leaked again and four candidates were found with cellphones. But the district administration decided to treat the test as valid.

Khandalkar, who runs a coaching class for competitive exams in Yavatmal, had applied for the exam under four different names. He received the hall tickets too. On October 4, he chose to write the exam from M K Sheth Gujarati High School in Manickpur, Vasai. He completed the two-hour paper in 30 minutes. He used the remaining time to SMS the answers to his accomplices.

The accomplices then forwarded the answers to candidates who had sneaked in their cellphones to the exam centres.

On October 18, four candidates, all from interior Maharashtra, were caught from four of the 60 centres across the district. Their arrests led to Khandalkar, who is suspected to have appeared for this exam too. The police are also investigating his role in other competitive exams.

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